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Gasoline Alley, 1/4/19

One of the slow-burn running gags (“gags”) in Gasoline Alley is that Rufus, who I would describe as a “comically moronic rustic,” is in love with Mayor Melba, who is also his boss. It’s funny because he’s a comical moron, and she’s the mayor! Except today we learn that Melba herself is not terribly bright, or at least has some fairly specific deficits when it comes to language processing. So she and Rufus can be together after all! Hooray! This is great news for all those Melbus shippers Ruba stans people out there who are rooting for Rufus and Melba to get together, a constituency I have faith actually exists,

Mary Worth, 1/4/19

“But I am worried, Mary! Worried that I’m going to have to develop feelings for him! Is this what it’s come to? That I can’t just be married to Ian, but I have to like him, too?”

Beetle Bailey, 1/4/19

Who could forget the classic 1997 film Air Bud, with its hilarious and memorable catchphrase, “Ain’t no rules says a dog can’t play basketball!” Well, what if, in the subsequent scenes, the characters discovered that while technically there isn’t a specific rule preventing dogs from playing basketball or other organized sports, there are a whole host of rules — about minimum ages, regulation uniforms, ball-handling techniques, and the like — that dogs by their very nature are incapable of satisfying? Wouldn’t that be … even funnier? Probably, says Beetle Bailey!

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Mark Trail, 12/16/18

Mark Trail Nature Sundays ought by right to be about animals, or maybe plants, or in a pinch, fungi. I am not thrilled with a whole installment that’s about an essentially geological phenomenon, and even less thrilled by the fact that they won’t even show it to us. Are we supposed to be satisfied with Mark locking eyes with us and saying “jacuzzi of despair” with a very serious facial expression while Cherry ever-so-subtly arches her back to lift her bikini’d bosom towards the orange, glowing sky? Because I’m not satisfied, OK? The god-damned boat in the first panel never even explodes! This is a sub-optimal Sunday!

Panels from Beetle Bailey, 12/16/18

I’m … pretty sure that Beetle is clinically depressed, guys.

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Beetle Bailey, 11/23/18

I think the key to this whole very strange Beetle Bailey is the use of the past tense in panel one. Beetle was a great guy, but now that his General Halftrack disguise has been perfected, Beetle no longer exists. One wonders how the world will work with two General Halftracks in it — but then, maybe the General is in the past tense too. Maybe that shockingly realistic mask is less Mission Impossible and more Silence of the Lambs, if you know what I mean. (I mean that Beetle has hollowed out Halftrack’s head and is wearing it like a helmet.)

Mary Worth, 11/23/18

No…nobody says that? Nobody says “Open a new window, open a new door”, Mary. Are you thinking of the saying “When God closes a door, he opens a window”? Because the implications of that are very different from whatever it is you just said. If this thing ends with Libby fleeing from Mary’s apartment into an uncaring world through all the doors and windows she left open, I’m gonna be pissed.

Dennis the Menace, 11/23/18

Man, I find the Mitchells’ little smiles honestly chilling. “Oh, you just now figured out that you don’t get to do fun stuff all the time? Get ready to spend the rest of your life eating shit to make other people happy, kid.”